


not yet

by extasiswings



Series: playground love [6]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: (sort of), Canon Compliant, F/M, Family Feels, Love Confessions, M/M, Sibling Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-04-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:00:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23745718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/extasiswings/pseuds/extasiswings
Summary: In which Maddie puts some pieces together, Buck comes clean, and someone else has a confession to make.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley & Maddie Buckley, Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Maddie Buckley/Howie "Chimney" Han
Series: playground love [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1696435
Comments: 36
Kudos: 457





	not yet

**Author's Note:**

> Most of this is set right before and after the third installment of this series, but the final section follows the last one.

Maddie Buckley is not an idiot. She’s made a habit of trying to respect boundaries the way she would like her own respected, which means that for the most part she isn’t inclined to poke and prod her brother for information about his life. Most of the time, Buck is transparent anyway, offering up anything and everything, wearing his heart on his sleeve. So when he does keep something to himself, Maddie knows it’s important and requires patience. Her curiosity is not more important than his privacy, after all—he’ll tell her when she’s ready.

Of course, by the time New Years comes and goes, her curiosity and her patience are both nearing their peaks.

“Does Buck seem...okay to you?” Maddie asks one night. Howie leans up on one elbow and looks over.

“I haven’t noticed anything at work,” he replies with a shrug. “He seems like his old self. Why?”

“I don’t know, just wondering. It feels like I haven’t seen him as much lately is all.”

“You think he’s avoiding you?” Howie asks. 

Maddie shakes her head. “Not necessarily, I don’t think he would intentionally. But he’s definitely been busy. Is he seeing someone?”

That could explain it. Both his absence and why he hasn’t said anything. After getting dumped in a hospital bed—and Maddie still feels sometimes like she should have taken that woman to the mat over that—she wouldn’t be surprised if her brother wanted to keep a relationship to himself until he was sure it wouldn’t fall apart. But that doesn’t stop her from feeling protective at the idea, from wanting to know so she can make sure whoever he’s with is good enough. To make sure he’s being treated right.

“I know he’s been spending a lot of time at Eddie’s hanging out with Christopher,” Howie says. “Seems like he really loves that kid, and I think it’s been good for him. But if he’s seeing someone, he hasn’t said anything to any of us.”

Something about the statement sticks in Maddie’s head. She hums and cuddles close, dropping the subject, but even then keeps turning it over in her mind.

Because Maddie Buckley is not an idiot. And Buck is not subtle. She hasn’t forgotten those months right after she moved, when Buck was still hung up on Abby but couldn’t stop talking about Eddie every chance he got. She hasn’t forgotten the day he helped her move, when she first admitted she thought Howie was cute and Buck assumed she had been referring to Eddie. The difference back then was that Eddie had still been married. Even now, she hasn’t spent enough time with him or the two of them to be able to say anything for sure, but—

She thinks back to the party at Eddie’s house, to Buck’s oddly defensive, _I’m not exactly a guest_ , and she wonders. As she replays the memory with a new hypothesis in mind, she remembers things she hadn’t paid a lot of attention to at the time—the way Eddie had casually touched Buck’s waist when passing him on his way to the kitchen, the way Christopher interacted with Buck not like he was a family friend but like he was another parent, the way Buck and Eddie had been standing close while everyone else was leaving, talking quietly with soft smiles. 

Maddie inhales sharply and Howie starts.

“You okay?” He asks.

“Do you think—” she starts. But then she shakes her head and settles back against him again. “Nevermind.”

“If you’re sure.”

It takes her a long time to fall asleep.

Of course, after that, there’s no way for Maddie to fully confirm her hypothesis without asking. And that leaves her in the same place as before—wanting to give Buck space, wanting to allow him his privacy, but wildly curious. 

So, she cheats just a little.

“Thanks again for having me, this was fun,” Josh says after dinner.

“For some of us,” Buck jokes.

“Well, all our couple friends were busy, so we figured we would target solos,” Howie replies.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were setting us up.” It may have been a perfectly innocent comment, but Maddie thinks she could kiss Josh for providing such a good opening.

“Oh, no, I like you way too much to set you up with my brother,” she teases.

“Uh, hey now,” Buck interjects.

“And,” she adds, “I love you too much to let you keep being so incredibly, tragically—”

“Some might say embarrassingly,” Howie notes.

“—single.” 

Maddie watches her brother as he grins shyly and rubs at the back of his neck, noticing the way his eyes flick to his phone and then away. He doesn’t correct her—instead, he and Josh play off each other in a dramatic tirade against online dating—but there’s something about it that feels not quite genuine to her.

“He _is_ seeing someone,” she says later, after Buck and Josh have left, when she and Howie are washing the dishes before bed.

“Buck?”

She takes a plate from him and hums in acknowledgment as she dries it off.

“That whole speech he gave didn’t convince you?” Howie asks.

“He was squirrely about it,” she replies. “I know my brother, he was trying too hard to have been telling the truth.” 

“Why would he lie? I’m not doubting your instinct, but it seems like kind of a silly thing to hide.”

Maddie bites her lip, considering the fact that she’s almost positive that Buck is with Eddie, and equally as positive that her brother hasn’t dated another guy before. It’s not her place to say that if he hasn’t though, so instead she says—

“I don’t know. I suppose he’s not ready for some reason.” 

Howie finishes the last plate and sets it on the counter before wrapping his arms around her waist. 

“He’ll let us know when he is.”

“I know,” Maddie acknowledges. Then she smiles and brings her hand up to his face. “Let’s go to bed.”

Buck comes over again the next day.

He’s shifty and awkward standing in her kitchen, clearly trying for casual and failing miserably. 

“So, uh, last night,” he says.

“Yeah?” Maddie prompts. “What about it? It was fun, right?”

“Yeah, it was fun. I just, uh, well, I wanted to say that I’m—” Buck shoves his hands in his pockets and looks up to the ceiling as he blows out a breath. “Fuck, why is this hard?”

Maddie takes pity on him. “You’re seeing someone.”

Buck glances over and flushes. “You...knew?”

She shrugs. “Not for sure, but I thought you might be.”

“It’s Eddie,” he admits, the initial nerves vanishing from his voice. “I’m seeing Eddie.”

“Does he make you happy?”

Buck ducks his head, a wide grin stretching across his mouth, and Maddie has to bite back a smile of her own. 

“I’ll take that as a yes,” she teases, knocking into his shoulder. 

Buck laughs quietly. “It feels...right, you know? Being with him, helping to take care of Christopher, it’s—I feel like I’m really doing something right.”

Maddie hugs him then, as tightly as she can. 

“I’m glad,” she says. “I’m really proud of you, you know.”

Buck squeezes her gently before pulling back. “Look at us—being all healthy and functional in our grown-up relationships.” 

“Who would have thought?” Maddie jokes. “For you, at least.”

“Hey!”

They’re still laughing when Howie comes by later.

* * *

It takes several long minutes for Maddie to settle after coming out of the dispatch building following the hostage situation. Her heart is racing, she can’t think, can’t breathe—really, she just wants to be held and cry. And thankfully, Howie is right there and she can do just that.

Finally though, she calms down enough to focus on her other surroundings, pulling back to swipe at her eyes.

“Do you want to see Buck?” Howie asks. “He’s right over there—but I can get Athena to take you home if you’d rather—”

“No, no,” she says. “I should see him, god, he must be worried sick. After—we can go after.” 

When they find him, Buck nearly crushes her with how hard he hugs her. 

“I’m okay,” Maddie assures, hugging him back. “I’m okay.”

“Do you need a ride back to your car, Buck?” Howie asks when they separate.

Buck makes a strange face—a little worried, a little sick. Maddie stares.

“Eddie’s coming to pick me up,” he says.

“What’s wrong?” She asks. 

“Nothing you need to worry about,” Buck replies. “It’s stupid—”

“No, tell me.”

He makes another face and sighs.

“I told Eddie I love him. A few minutes ago on the phone.”

“And?”

“And...I don’t know. He didn’t say it back.”

“Well, what did he say?”

Buck runs a hand through his hair. “He—nothing really, he just got very quiet and told me he would be here soon. And then he hung up.”

“Want me to kick his ass?” Maddie asks. “I nearly killed a guy with an epi-pen this morning, so I’m ready to throw down.”

That startles a small laugh out of him. “No,” he says. “No, I—like I said, it’s stupid, and it’s early, and he shouldn’t say it just because I did, right?”

She thinks about the night before, about her own feelings on the subject, about trying to make the words come and not being able to because they were weighed down by too much baggage. She swallows hard.

“Just because he didn’t say it doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel it,” she replies, squeezing his arm. “Sometimes...words are hard.”

“Buck!” Right as Maddie steps back, a familiar truck pulls up on the other side of the police barricade. Eddie jumps out of it, leaving the door open as he jogs over, clearly only having eyes for one person.

“That was fast—” Buck manages, but that’s all he gets out before he’s being thoroughly kissed.

When Eddie breaks the kiss, he presses his forehead to Buck’s, his thumbs tracing slow circles on Buck’s hips. Maddie looks away, the scene feeling too intimate for anyone else to watch. She reaches for Howie’s hand and gestures with her head that they should go. But just as they turn away, she catches—

“I had a plan, you know. I didn’t want to say it on the phone because I wanted—”

“You don’t have to—”

“I love you.”

Maddie smiles and glances over at Howie.

“Let’s go home,” she says. She doesn’t need to hear anything else.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Not Yet/Love Run Reprise" by The Amazing Devil.


End file.
